Doctors on the Front Line - Somos Community Care - New York Encounter 2020

The New York Encounter

Caring for people and communities on the periphery with Mario Paredes, chief executive officer of Somos Community Care, and Ricardo Rivera, chief development officer of Somos Community Care

SOMOS is a physician-led network of more than 2,500 physicians and 800 community health providers responsible for the health of more than 650,000 Medicaid patients living in New York City—particularly members of the Asian, African-American and Latino communities.

In a great many cases, SOMOS doctors work and live in the same neighborhoods as their patients, often sharing their linguistic and ethnic backgrounds. Indeed, cultural sensibility and compatibility between provider and patient is of the utmost importance. It is one of the remedies for the traditional labyrinthine, impersonal, hospital-based health-care system in which poor and vulnerable patients—especially recent and new immigrants—have a hard time making their way, let alone feeling comfortable, cared for or understood.

Since doctors are neighborhood-based, they get to know their patients, in turn making the patients feel understood, listened to and cared for. SOMOS workers visit patients at home as necessary, assess their living conditions, and make sure medical regimens and appointments are kept. This approach is at the heart of SOMOS’ traditional yet revolutionary mission and method. Speakers will recount the origins of SOMOS and share stories of doctors having crossed the divide between excellent health care and poverty.